Skin mole removal

sheryl77August 7, 2009

Anyone know how to get rid of moles? I have one that has cropped up on my forehead. It is not the flat kind. I heard you could use bloodroot and I have been trying that with no effect. I ground some bloodroot and put it in oil to extract.

There is no good safe way to remove skin moles through any herbal/home method.

Bloodroot-based salves or pastes have been touted for this purpose, sometimes with the claim that the salve targets only abnormal tissue. The reality is that bloodroot is a corrosive agent that eats away at all tissue, normal or healthy. The results can be catastrophic with severe scarring and disfigurement resulting from use (warning - disturbing images).

A more serious problem with use of bloodroot or any escharotic agent is that there's no way to know if you're getting rid of the whole lesion, which can recur - or worse. Pigmented lesions can be deceptive in appearance, and the consequences of not adequately treating a melanoma instead of the benign mole you may think you have, likely would be dire. Such lesions often have microscopic extensions that you can't see with the naked eye. Proper surgical excision of skin lesions leaves little or no scarring and has the advantage of allowing for correct diagnosis and establishing that there are clear margins so that lesions don't recur and/or metastasize.

Sorry if all this sounds unnecessarily scary, but people using these preparations have run into serious problems (as the link demonstrates). Plastic surgery to fix damage caused by bloodroot on the face or other conspicuous part of the skin is going to be a lot more expensive than having an offending skin lesion removed by excisional biopsy.

I once cut off a mole, not on purpose but with a saw that skipped off of a piece of wood, I would rather have it back then have the scar. If you get it biopsied use sun screen on it and wear a hat, sunlight tends to lead to scars that stand out. You might also try massaging the area with vitamin E daily to loosen the scar tissue up.

Speaking from vast experience with moles and skin cancers of varying kinds (I've had literally dozens removed, in some cases involving plastic surgery), I can tell you that unless you're a properly trained professional, you'll leave them well alone. Some can go very deep under the skin, don't just grow on the surface, and so surface treatments just won't do the job - and I sure don't recommend that people go digging around if they can't accurately locate things like arteries, veins, nerves, etc. As Brendan says, you don't want whopping great scars, either!

Another problem is that unless a mole is removed properly, the risk of it becoming cancerous increases enormously. Even if you accidentally knock a mole, or otherwise cause it to bruise or bleed, it's best to have it checked, both at the time of the injury, and a few weeks afterwards (or as advised by your doctor).

You local doctor should be able to remove growths in his surgery, as long as you're sure he knows one mole from another (it's a fairly specialised field, requiring special training, so not all doctors can do it). He will probably want to do a biopsy first, for ID purposes, and to make absolutely sure he can get the whole thing, roots and all.

I largely agree with what daisy says, except for one thing - trauma to a mole (a.k.a. nevus) is not generally thought to promote malignant behavior. What may happen if a mole is partially removed or traumatized in some way is that it can develop features (such as irregular growth) that simulate a malignant appearance and be mistaken for melanoma, without evaluation by a knowledgeable physician.

Most physicians who excise moles (these include dermatologists, general surgeons and plastic surgeons) should remove the entire pigmented lesion at one time rather than biopsying a part of it (unless it's very large). Biopsies are more accurate if you can evaluate the entire lesion (one part taken in isolation could look benign while malignancy is present in the remaining tissue).

There are no creams or pastes that safely remove moles without risk of scarring, and more importantly none that can guarantee complete removal of malignant or premalignant lesions (that can look deceptively benign to the naked eye).

As to the claim that trauma makes ordinary moles turn malignant - I've yet to see any documentation of this. Links to studies on this question would be appreciated.

If you still have some fresh roots from the Bloodroot plants you could try using the red juice unadulterated and applied directly to the wart. At the PFAF link above you can find a page on Bloodroot. Both Bloodroot and Celandine are in the same family, Papaver, and appear to have the same action concerning warts and moles.

I tried to learn the "truth behind skin mole removal" from liz s's link but just saw a bunch of testimonials promoting a $30 book written by someone without qualifications on treatment of skin problems.

It's important to know that reliance on "all natural methods" (in particular, caustic salves made from products like bloodroot) not only can cause severe skin damage and scarring, they could kill you.

"A 52-year-old man was seen with an enormous recurrent basal cell carcinoma of the left nose, lip, and cheek. Several years earlier, he had undergone biopsy of a lesion on the left side of his nose, and Mohs surgery was recommended. On the advice of a friend, he (avoided) surgery in favor of topical treatment with (bloodroot). The treatment led to the clinical resolution of the lesion. Gradually, the patient noted a fullness of the left side of his nose. On presentation he had a bulky exophytic/endophytic lesion of the left side of his nose that was nearly fixed to the maxilla. Two stages of Mohs surgery under general anesthesia were needed to remove the lesion that extended deeply to the maxilla and far into the pyriform aperture. Residual tumor that was adherent to the maxilla was successfully removed by partial maxillectomy. The dramatic surgical defect was repaired with a septal mucosal flap, cheek advancement, and forehead flap. The lesion subsequently metastasized to the submandibular lymph nodes requiring a modified radical neck dissection and adjuvant radiation therapy. Recently, the patient presented with multiple distant bony metastases and has been referred to oncologists."

So an ordinary skin cancer which could have been completely removed with a surgical excision early on, instead was allowed (through ineffective bloodroot treatment) into a giant cancer that has spread to other parts of this man's body and likely killed him. Most people with moles who try bloodroot will risk only bad cosmetic results with scarring and potential disfigurement (based on the myth that bloodroot only targets diseased tissue - it actually burns everything away). Some, who actually have melanomas and don't realize it, could lose their lives.

Don't take the risk - get your moles removed safely by a physician with the proper training.